word.

Upper body

Once upon a time, I ran from the Denver Airport to downtown for a WordCamp conference. It was 30 miles each way. Much to my surprise, the part of my body that hurt most were my shoulders and arms. Apparently, dangling your arms for 8+ hours while bouncing down the road can lead to fatigue. Who knew?

I’ve learned that good running form requires much more than just legs. It’s a complex movement that transfers the the kinetic energy generated by your body weight, from you shoulders, through your hips and ending in contact with the ground. I can’t explain the physics any better than that because I’m a few laces short of a pair… But when I’m running and my body feels at peak efficiency, this image comes to mind:

Upper body workout for runners:

My workout of choice is a variation of the Tire Pull. This will not increase your max bench press, or bulk up your arms. But it is a tough workout that is remarkably close to the arm movements of running.

I learned the hard way that this workout can damage your back if you start out with too much weight in the tire. If you’re twisting from the waist, it’s is a good sign that the weight might be too much. I’ve been at this for a while and have identified an appropriate weight that is just heavy enough. In this video my waist is twisting, but under slow and controlled movements. This control is critical to avoiding back injury.

2 thoughts on “Upper body”

If you take this on the go (which I take from the gate in the video/pict, and the tire pull #1 video), and want to save space in your car, you can also use your Jeep’s spare. Just couple it with a tied piece of carpet to avoid tire wear (bonus: added friction in a lot of cases). And then you have an excuse to upgrade to 33″ tires on the Jeep. You know, for your health. 😉

Weight training is all right ofcourse, but recent studies show tire drags improve sprinting times on multiple levels.Louie simmons got his strongest ever with drags ( he runs Westside barbell, they have the best strength athletes in the world that’s what everybody who’s anybody says).You can use super heavy tires and go very slow with them too, get on your knees and press them off your chest, or even press them back and forth to one another while half squating , use one arm on your knees, drag them forward, or arms behind you while dragging row the tire to yourself like the video above, there is no harder workout on the planet.I do know they work every single muscle group you have, you can even farmers walk with them, you’ll just need a few sizes for the sake of variety.Ive seen guys increase their RUNNING TIMES by just adding tire drags , pushes etc ( grip strength and forearms too) id going to say they are the best training tool out there ( now I just got to buy a prowler) lol